WENDOVER: Real Magic Books

Sunday 20th October, 2024

3:30pm

Event information

Neverland is the debut work of non-fiction by award-winning slam poet Vanessa Kisuule, this is a love letter to the musicians we adore and an unflinching look at the costs of hero worship

Vanessa Kisuule is a big Michael Jackson fan. This fixation once gave her great joy, but now it keeps her up at night. In her bracingly honest, energetic and lively book she explores the fall-out from that fandom and how, or if, we can hold people to account whilst loving them at the same time.

Why do famous musicians mean so much to us? How does the pop culture machine both mirror and magnify the worst aspects of human nature? Why is it so hard to accept that the people we love, famous or not, are capable of doing terrible things?

As debates rage on about abusive public figures, Kisuule asks not just if we should separate the art from the artist, but how this moral conundrum informs the way we shape our relationships, families and notions of social justice. Witty, poetic and with references to R. Kelly, Britney Spears and a host of other famous faces, Neverland is both an ardent love letter to the music we love and an unflinching look at the costs of hero worship.

Vanessa Kisuule is a writer and performer based in Bristol. She has been featured on BBC iPlayer, Radio 1 and Radio 4’s Woman’s Hour, and has written for Guardian, NME and Lonely Planet. Burning Eye Books publish her poetry. Kisuule is the co-tutor for Southbank New Poets Collective 2021-22 and was Bristol City Poet 2018-20. Her poem on the historic toppling of Edward Colston’s statue ‘Hollow’ gained over 600,000 views on Twitter in three days.

‘One of the most interesting writers at work in this country today. An exhilarating stylist and a beautiful thinker’ MAX PORTER

‘Neverland is a brutal, brave and beautifully written book’ YOMI ADEGOKE

‘An exquisitely written, breathtakingly honest, deeply intelligent book that the world needs, that will ignite your humanity in unexpected ways. Vanessa Kisuule is a rare and brave talent’ DEBORAH FRANCES-WHITE